The Call
by Oleander's One
Summary: An old man confronts the shadows of his past and faces one he never thought to see again.


_Many thanks to mille libri for the speedy and excellent beta._

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The howls woke Solus from his restless sleep, as they had three nights running. A lone wolf, joined by a second, a third; soon a dozen joined their voices in the undulating cry. "Leave me alone!" he heard himself shout to the empty cabin. Heart squeezing painfully in his sunken chest, he sat up and leaned against the headboard, trembling.

An old man, frightened into impotent defiance by beasts safely outside his walls. Cursing his anxiety and his stiff knees equally, he rose and slowly crossed the room to build up the fire. He fixed a mug of tea with the last of the shredded willow bark and drank it down, gagging slightly at the harsh taste, as he always did.

The cabin had been snug and dry once, the solid construction and careful joinery keeping out the intense cold of the Ferelden winters. Much like its builder, the house was showing its age and a faltering attention to detail. The chinking now gapped and crumbling in places, the logs shifted and ill-fitting, they too groaned with the bitter winds that swept down the eastern slope of the mountains.

Solus settled in the hearthside chair and drew a blanket around his shoulders, waiting for the pain in his knees and his hands to recede enough to attempt a few more hours of sleep.

~oOo~

There. There again, pricking at the edge of his vision. Grey, black, dirty white coats, a glimpse of amber eyes, watching him silently. Solus looked up from his garden to scan the line of trees; brown, leafless remnants of ferns swayed slightly in the breeze at the feet of the skeletal birches and oaks.

They had been there—he refused to believe he was so far gone as to imagine their presence, not in the cold light of day. He shook the dirt off the carrots and turnips he'd dug, pushed the hay back over the mounds of earth, and returned the shovel to the lean-to before retreating inside. There were a dozen wizened apples in the cellar, a bit of dried beef, and perhaps a half-bushel of vegetables still in the ground. He would need to make the trip to the village soon. There was coin enough for flour and salt, dried meat and beans. It would be enough.

Driven from his home as a young man, he spent almost ten years traveling and trading labor for food, learning basic building and cultivation skills. He threaded a winding path through Orlais, Nevarra, and the Free Marches before returning to Ferelden, as he knew he would. Settling outside a tiny village in the foothills of the Frostbacks, he hunted and raised what he could, and trapped to barter for the rest. He knew too well what the villagers said of him. He was an old man, marking his time now by the day instead of the season, the breadth of his world by the perimeter of a small valley.

Alone most of his life, Solus had never married or even considered it. There had been one, once. One who had meant everything to the young man that he had been. She was lost, and Solus had gone on. But that door he shut tightly.

He thought of her now, while he finished his thin soup. What she would make of this tired man with clouded eyes, the measure of his life within his failing sight.

~oOo~

The ranging howls shook him from sleep once again, dragging him from the greyish-white of his faded dreamscape. Pulling on boots and his heavy coat, he took down his sword from where it hung near the hearth, staggering slightly under the weight.

Throwing open the door, Solus stumbled out into the moonlit night, heedless of the cold. He could no more ignore the pull of the howling cries as he could the strange, crushing weight on his chest, or the wheeze of his labored breathing as he lurched down the path to the forest.

"Why now? It was long … so long ago. So …" His boot caught on an unseen root; Solus's sword tumbled from numb fingers, and he fell to his hands and knees in the snow.

He knew they were there, amongst the trees. Their golden eyes would shine and they would melt out of the darkness, and they would come for him at last.

~oOo~

He must have fallen.

Even before he opened his eyes, he could feel them surrounding him, surging in to sniff and dance away as quickly, yipping and snapping at each other in their nervousness.

Too disoriented to summon any real defense, he growled his futile defiance at the jostling tide of wolves. Too soon a set of sharp teeth would lock on his leg, holding him while others darted in to bite and pull and rip. He'd borne witness to countless such hunts in his youth.

The yips and calls changed, unified. He fancied he could make sense of the repeated sounds.

_She comes, she comes, she comes._

A warming breeze, bringing pine pitch and rain and wilder things. The scent of a day so long ago, when she had come to him, to them, her voice and presence a balm to the scalding poison in their blood. She whispered of men and wolves, and those caught between. She spoke of names, and led him to his.

How fitting, that he should meet his end in sight of the one he failed, all of those years past. His should have been the steadying hand, his the will to keep them together in the aftermath. Instead they had flown apart, to the ends of Ferelden and beyond, scattered and at the mercy of those they met as they fled.

_It is not the end, Swiftrunner, unless you wish it._

The ranks of wolves parted; her white-silver fur shone like the moon breaking from behind clouds. The crackling vines that wrapped her powerful legs were as familiar to him as the blue veins that mapped his once-strong hands.

_Lady. I don't deserve your mercy. I wasn't strong enough then, and I am not strong enough now to return to what I once was._

_Zathrian's vengeance is spent. Never again will our people bend and stoop; no more will their blood burn in their veins. Those you led made their own way as men, as you did. But the memory of the wolf, of the pack, is never lost. Look to your sisters and brothers._

Startled, he looked again to the wolves that surrounded them. Mottled brown and grey, black going silver at the muzzle, white shading to tan; Gatekeeper, Limper, Silent. Others known to him and more who were not. They watched him steadily, pride and leashed energy in every line and movement.

_Lead us_.

Swiftrunner rose to his feet, warmth and new strength flowing through his powerful frame. A rush of air filling his deep chest brought a dizzying array of scents, familiar and foreign. His large ears twitched at the step of a doe through the underbrush, the scurry of a vole through the leaves. The restless stir of his fellows brought him back to himself.

_Come, Beloved._

They turned to the east, to the first faint rays of dawn painting the horizon.

_We run._


End file.
